Ava's "Marker" Reveal

If you have followed our blog, you might remember this post, where we talked about how difficult it was to design Ava's marker, well here is the big reveal of our princess' marker. =)

First, this is our view when we get out of the car. Ava's marker is in the back, on the left with the flowers.  We love how you can see the shiny gold from her marker just as soon as you step out of the car. Although it's hard to tell from the picture quality, the shiny gold helps her marker stand out from the rest (one of the reasons it made it extra difficult to order). =)

Adding her picture horizontally was another feature that is not very common.  Most markers, if they even have pictures, are vertical, so this was just one more thing that made her marker more difficult to order.  We love how it turned out though. =)

Through this, J and I have also had to learn how to put flower arrangements together.  As you can see from the flowers above, we're still mastering that new talent. =)

 

Our attempt of "family photos". . . taken in pieces.

 

 

On Saturday as we were out shopping, we decided to stop and visit our princess for a lil bit. As we pulled up, we noticed they had cleared out ALL of the flowers and decorations in Babyland.  This has happened to us before and each time I see it, I get a knot in my stomach. I am just so disgusted that they clear out EVERYTHING! After our visit, we went back to the back of the cemetary, by the dumpsters, where they have storage tubs that they put all of the decorations from Babyland. We dug through the tubs, looking not just for Ava's things, but any of the other items that we could recongize and put back where they belong. As we were leaving, we noticed something new...something that has always been there before, something that we have drove by probably fifty times and never noticed it, but for some reason it caught our eye on Saturday. We noticed a section with lots of tiny markers, probably a fourth the size of Ava's. We were curious, so we drove back around so we could take a look at it.  I noticed the cherub statue and with the tiny markers, I instantly thought it must have been the original Babyland. We got out of the car to take a look, and sure enough it was. We looked around for a little bit and as we did I began to get emotional.   I came across this marker. . .

His name was Martin, his birthday was May 24, 1963 and his angelversary was May 25, 1963 (the day we were visiting). Just like Ava, there were no days in between his birthday and angelversary. This year, Martin would have been fifty years old.  We were amazed how there was a fresh new set of flowers on his marker, not sure if they were there in honor of his birthday, angelversary, Memorial Day or a combination of all, but it made us stop and think about him and who delivered his flowers. Was it his parents, siblings, or another loved one? Then the realization hit me, that this is our life, our future.  Fifty years from now, we will still be visiting our sweet lil princess, Ava, in Babyland.

Happy Memorial Day Weekend!

 

Thanks for following along with us,

Spring Soccer

B's Spring Soccer Season is officially over, so I thought it would be fun to show a collection of some of my favorite pictures from the season.  Well, from the games I remembered to take my camera, that is. . . =)

B and one of his best buddies. I'd love to know what he is whispering to him. =)

This was their last season to play 4 on 4. Next season they will play 7 on 7 with official positions.  Even though they did not have official positions the last few seasons, B did play "sweeper" quite a bit, it's similar to a goalie, he just couldn't use his hands like a goalie. . .so that's why you will see lots of pictures of him in front of the goal by himself. He wanted to make sure everyone knew he wasn't just a "flower picker."  =)

Team Captains =)

And finally getting his "end of season" trophy. B has really started to love soccer, so this summer he plans on attending a soccer camp for the first time. We also signed him up for an indoor soccer league that he is super excited about!

What's in a Name...

Many people have asked where we came up with Ava's middle name, Lakelynn so we thought we would just write a post explaining how our baby girl got her name "Ava Lakelynn".

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When we first found out we were having a girl, I suggested to J we name her Ava. Ava was my grandma's name (my dad's mom), her full name was Ava Lee King, but she actually always went by her middle name, Lee instead of Ava. She was a first grade school teacher for 30+ years and passed away from breast cancer when I was in third grade.  Even though I didn't get to spend nearly enough time with her, she has always had a special place in my heart. I've always loved her name Ava, in fact, if B would have been a girl, his name would have been Ava.  J originally thought Ava was a "diva" name when I suggested it and he didn't like it. I didn't pursue it, instead I scoured through baby name websites trying to come up with other ideas.

One day, I was on Pinterest and came across a cute pin of a gorgeous pregnant woman.  It intrigued me, so I clicked on the pin and it took me to her blog. The particular post that was pinned was on her daughter, Laikynn's birth story. When I originally read her daughter's name, I read it as Laiklynn, not Laikynn. As I said it aloud to myself, I thought it was PERFECT for us! "Laik" because we got married at the lake and "lynn" because my middle name was Lynn.  I know, it's kind of cheezy, but I thought it was perfect! I mentioned it to the boys and surprisingly they both LOVED it! J asked me how we would want to spell it, Laiklynn or Lakelynn?? I told him I would go back to the blog and see how they spelled it and thats when I recognized my mistake. Her daughter's name was NOT Laiklynn, it was Laikynn. Oops! At that point we were already set on the name Lakelynn, so we decided since we were "creating a new name", we might as well create our own spelling for it too. Our baby girl was going to be named Lakelynn Abraham.

Lake= because we got married at the lake  

lynn= after my middle name

At the time, we were still looking for a middle name for Lakelynn. In a storage tub of old pregnancy clothes (that J was putting back up in the attic), he found a Baby Name book that my oldest sister had passed down to me. They had used it with my nineteen year old nephew, so it was almost 20 years old!  J started looking through the A names and once he came across "Ava", he said it aloud, and then said "what do you think about Ava?" I said "are you serious?!?" he said "yeah, why??" Then I refreshed his memory that I had already suggested that and he thought it sounded too "divaish". Thankfully, his mind changed and now he loved the name Ava. . .so we came up with Lakelynn Ava Abraham. . .still secretly wanting her first name to be Ava, I switched it around and said it aloud, "how about Ava Lakelynn Abraham?" It had such a cute ring to it, J LOVED it! We shared it with B and originally he was disappointed because he liked the name Lakelynn so much, he wanted that to be her first name, luckily he soon got over it. =)

So there you have it, how our lil girl got her name Ava Lakelynn.  Ava after my grandma and Lakelynn a name I accidently created. =)

Thanks for following along with us,

Morning Reflections

On our way to school this morning, I had an epiphany.  B was sound asleep and I was left with just my thoughts. I started thinking about what most everyone, especially in my home state, is thinking about right now, the tornado in Moore, OK yesterday and all of the tragic distruction it caused.

Before I get to my epiphany, let me give you a quick back story first. . .
The other day, I posted about Brayden accidently getting in the pool with his iTouch in his pocket. I was very devastated! I'm a very sentimental person and I get attached to things very easily. Sad to say, I was very attached to B's iTouch. I was VERY attached to the memories of it, his pictures, his pictures of Ava, even his apps. While I was on bedrest, I would help B (daily) play a particular game on his iTouch so he could "level up" faster.  I know it sounds SO ridiculous. =)

Yesterday, after we set his iTouch in a bag of rice for almsot 48hours we decided to check on it. I plugged it into my car charger and we got really excited when we saw this. . .

Better than a blank screen, right? We crossed our fingers and couldn't wait to get home to connect it to a computer/iTunes.  After a few minutes of it on the charger, B asked if he could see it so I passed it back to him and he had the obvious/brilliant idea of actually turning it on to see if it worked. Once he did, we got this. . .

B and I immediately cheered! He exclaimed "it's a miracle!! It's a gift from Ava!"  We were so excited!

Unfotunately, once we started using it, we noticed the "home" button doesn't seem to work. Once you are in an app, you have to turn it completely off and then back on to exit out of the app. B played around with it and after a few times of turning it off/on, it decided to stay off.  I hadn't even had a chance to connect it to the computer to back everything up. The iTouch went back into the bag of rice and instant devastation for us both.

Now, back to my epiphany. . .
As I was driving to work, I couldn't stop thinking about the tornado news coverage I had just finished watching before we left the house.  HUNDREDS of families lost EVERYTHING they owned including all of their family special pictures and memories they had.  It's very simple, but in the grand scheme of things, the loss of B's iTouch is NOTHING in comparison to what soo many others have lost the last couple of days.  His iTouch is replaceable (with his own money).  I need to be thankful of all the other pictures we have of Ava and B and not hung up on the ones we don't have from his iTouch. . .there are families that lost EVERYTHING.

Praying for all the victims, first responders, and volunteers! Can't even imagine!

B's Indoor Pool Party

Yesterday we had Brayden's 8th Birthday Party at the Allen Natatorium, a local indoor pool.  He had a GREAT time, but boy was it stressful! I usually love planning parties, but yesterday was different. I'm not for sure if it's because I am out of the "party planning groove" or if it's because my anxiety level is now heightened over every little thing. I was a nervous wreck leading up to the big event. . .worrying if we would have enough pizza, cookie cake, drinks, party favors, RSVP's at the last minute, etc. . . you name it, I was worried about it, times a hundred.

Shortly before we left, I couldn't help but think about lil Ava and how this would have been her first time to be introduced to a swimming pool. I went into her room and got out her swimsuit that she most likely would have worn yesterday. I hugged it tight up against my chest and imagined my lil girl wearing her cute lil swimsuit with her chubby lil swim diaper covering her bottom.

Would she have liked the water and all the splashing? As we visited our lil princess today after church, J and I imagined how yesterday would have been, had Ava been with us. J mentioned playing in the water with her, splashing around and B was quick to say "she probably wouldn't have even been IN the water because it's too germy and we wouldn't want her to be around all the germs."  Another example of what a protective (maybe too over protective) Big Brother he would have been. =)We also teased B that Ava more than likely would have been the "hit" of the party and he probably wouldn't have gotten as much attention from the girls if she would have been there. =)

As much worrying as I did, B's party turned out to be a big success and everything went as smoothly as it could.  A special thank you to my parents and good friend, Kristyn for helping us out, we could not have done it without ya'll!!!  Here are a few pictures from all the fun. . .

(not everyone in the pic is apart of our party)

B and some of his buddies floating down the lazy river.

My poor attempt of taking a picture of B going down the slide.

B swimming away from the slide.

One of B's friends jumping off the diving board, B wasn't brave enough to do this yet, maybe next time. =)

** In this space, WAS a picture of J enjoying the swimming fun, but when he reviewed the post he INSISTED I delete his picture.  He now wants to start a CrossFit Membership, effective immediately. =) **

Couple of the girls enjoying the waterfall.

Pizza time!! (and I forgot to take a group pic, so this is the closest thing, minus a few kids over on the side.) 

J passing out 2nds and 3rds of pizza...believe it or not, we went through 8 boxes of Papa Johns Large pizzas with NO leftovers!!

At home unwrapping presents. =)

B with his new stash of Nerf Guns, 

he is so impressed that it is taller than him. =)

and that's a bag of rice. . .inside that bag of rice is B's iTouch =( 

We're HOPING and crossing our fingers, the rice will be able to absorb the moisture and make it work again.

Apparently he was SO excited to get his party started, he completely forgot to take his iTouch out of his pocket before he got in the pool.  Why in the world he would have EVER put his iTouch in his SWIMMING SUIT Pocket is BEYOND me. When he originally brought it to me, my heart immediately sunk. Not because it was an expensive item that was just ruined, for me, I could careless how much it cost. I knew, at that moment,  that we would not be able to recover anything that was on his iTouch. . . in an instant, poor slip of judgement on B's part, everything on it was gone. . . pictures, pictures of Ava (I think I had texted myself all of them) self portraits B had took, memories of him facetiming me, texting me, calling me. . . all of that was gone, in an instant.  I can't help but think/wonder why, everything good that happens to us now, seems to always have a "but" or "catch to it."  The party was wonderful, we all had a great time, but the happiness was dampened by the loss of B's iTouch and the irreplaceable memories on it.

Although B had an amazing time, planning a party of this size was a bit much for us! On our way to the party, we teased B that next year he will have to choose between a big item present or a friend party. I'm already highly encouraging him to choose a big item present like last year. =)

Thanks for following along with us,